Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) vs GPT-5.6 Terra (Low)
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or GPT-5.6 Terra (Low) by OpenAI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-27.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fall… scores 13.3 points higher (40.8 vs 27.5) but costs 1.8× as much to run the benchmark ($622 vs $350; premium vs mid-range cost classes). Pick Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fall… when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise GPT-5.6 Terra (Low).
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) | GPT-5.6 Terra (Low) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 40.8 | 27.5 | −32.6% GPT-5.6 Terra (Low) is 32.6% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $622.28 | $350.36 | −43.7% GPT-5.6 Terra (Low) is 43.7% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 7.65s | 5.73s | −25.1% GPT-5.6 Terra (Low) is 25.1% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $10.0 | $2.00 / $12.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
GPT-5.6 Terra (Low) vs Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback): 32.6% less intelligence, 43.7% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 25.1% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (High) scores 50.20 for $521.
- GPT-5.6 Terra (Low) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Pro scores 46.30 for $207.
Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback)GPT-5.6 Terra (Low)Today's Pareto frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-sonnet-5-5-medium/gpt-5-6-terra-low · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-sonnet-5-5-medium/gpt-5-6-terra-low?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill